[51]
FOOTNOTES:
[48] N. and H. vi. 268; this account is derived from their twelfth
chapter.
[49] N. and H. vi. 309, from MS.
[50] The act was signed by the President, March 3, 1863.
[51] Concerning the deterioration of the army, in certain particulars,
see an article, "The War as we see it now," by John C. Ropes,
_Scribner's Magazine_, June, 1891.
CHAPTER VII
THE TURN OF THE TIDE
The winter of 1862-63 was for the Rebellion much what the winter of
Valley Forge was for the Revolution. It passed, however, and the nation
still clung fast to its purpose. The weak brethren who had become
dismayed were many, but the people as a whole was steadfast. This being
so, ultimate success became assured. Wise and cool-headed men, in a
frame of mind to contemplate the situation as it really was, saw that
the tide was about at its turning, and that the Union would not drift
away to destruction in this storm at any rate. They saw that the North
_could_ whip the South, if it chose; and it was now sufficiently evident
that it would choose,--that it would endure, and would finish its task.
It was only the superficial observers who were deceived by the Virginian
disasters, which rose so big in the foreground as partially to conceal
the real fact,--that the Confederacy was being at once strangled and
starved to death. The waters of the Atlantic Ocean and of the Gulf of
Mexico were being steadily made more and more inaccessible, as one
position after another along the coast gradually passed into Federal
hands.
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